1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to communication systems. More particularly, the present invention relates to a system and method for estimating path loss between wireless stations in an IEEE 802.11 wireless local area network (WLAN) and for using this value to more accurately adjust the transmit power level and/or transmission rate of each station.
2. Description of the Invention
In general, there are two variants of wireless local area networks (WLAN): infrastructure-based and ad hoc-type. In the former network, communication typically takes place only between the wireless nodes, called stations (STAY), and the access point (AP), whereas communication takes place between the wireless nodes in the latter network. The stations and the AP, which are within the same radio coverage, are known as a basic service set (BSS).
The IEEE 802.11 standard specifies the medium access control (MAC) and physical characteristics for a wireless local area network (WLAN) to support physical layer units. The IEEE 802.11 standard is defined in International Standard ISO/IEC 8802-11, “Information Technology—Telecommunications and information exchange area networks”, 1999 Edition, which is hereby incorporated by reference in its entirety.
Currently, the IEEE 802.11 does not provide any mechanism for providing dynamic transmit power control (TPC) between wireless stations within a BSS. Typically, each 802.11 STA uses a fixed transmission power level for all the frame transmissions throughout its lifetime. However, a new standard, IEEE 802.11h contemplates implementing the dynamic transmit power control (TPC). Accordingly, the present invention provides an improved TPC mechanism that can be implemented within the firmware of the proposed 802.11h MAC implementation without much complexity.